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Elon Musk’s company SpaceX has currently banned the flights of its most reliable rocket ‘Falcon 9’. The decision was taken after a technical fault occurred in the upper part of the rocket during a Starlink mission on Monday. Due to this grounding, NASA’s proposed ‘Crew-12’ mission for the International Space Station (ISS) may be postponed. Scientists are now trying to reach the root of this problem.
SpaceX stops flights of ‘Falcon 9’ rocket, launch of four astronauts stuck. (File Photo: SpaceX)
New Delhi: SpaceX, the world’s largest private space company, has temporarily stopped the flights of its workhorse ‘Falcon 9’ rocket. Elon Musk’s company has taken this decision after a technical glitch occurred during a Starlink satellite launch on Monday. This grounding may have a direct impact on NASA’s upcoming International Space Station (ISS) mission. NASA indicated on Tuesday that if the investigation takes time, the rotation process of astronauts may be delayed.
What was the fault that stopped the rocket’s speed?
On Monday, the Falcon 9 rocket successfully delivered 25 Starlink satellites into their orbit. The real problem came when the ‘deorbit burn’ process was started to bring the second stage (upper stage) of the rocket back to Earth. This part of the rocket could not function as planned. SpaceX said in a statement that some ‘off-nominal’ situations arose during preparations. Although the satellites had reached the right place, the failure of the rocket’s upper part to be destroyed in a controlled manner has become a safety concern.
During today’s Falcon 9 launch of @Starlink satellites, the second stage experienced an off-nominal condition during preparation for the deorbit burn. The vehicle then performed as designed to successfully passivate the stage. The first two MVac burns were nominal and safely…
